The harassment was passed down; the rumor was set into circulation among my colleagues. That was the worst. You can defend yourself against an attack, but there’s nothing you can do against libel. Every day I prepared myself for anything, including death. But I couldn’t cope with this perfidy. No preparation made it bearable. Libel stuffs you with filth; you suffocate because you can’t defend yourself. . . .
Since now I really had to make sure I came to work, but no longer had an office, and since my friend could no longer let me into hers, I stood in the stairwell, unable to decide what to do. I climbed up and down the stairs a few times and suddenly I was again my mother’s child, because I HAD A HANDKERCHIEF. I placed it on one of the stairs between the second and third floors, carefully smoothed it out and sat down. I rested my thick dictionaries on my knee and translated the descriptions of hydraulic machines. I was a staircase wit and my office was a handkerchief.
Sometimes I have Big Thoughts, which seem to me important. It would appear self-evident, though, that if these ideas are any good, someone must have come up with them before me. And if nobody has, it’s probably because they’re not as good as I think they are.
But I forge ahead, in all the boldness of the simple-minded. I have a sort of an answer to the problem of Theodicy.
No, make that a proposal for an answer.
No, not even that. An approach to a proposal.
In any case, I’ve written about these matters here before, but I think it’s been a while, perhaps quite a long time.
The problem of Theodicy is familiar to many of you. It’s one of the really big questions – if God is good, why does he permit such horrendous evil to exist in His world? (Recent events in the Middle East have given us ample cause to contemplate this question, when we’re not weeping, tearing our hair, and stocking up on ammunition.)
My proposal for thought is that we ought to look at the universe as a Story.
Every writer knows that there’s no story without conflict. And conflict means pain. One of the hardest disciplines many writers must learn is how to torture their characters. Although I love reading exciting stories, I often fear I can’t bear the stress when a good author turns the dramatic tension (which means fear and pain) up to 10. When I’m writing, I’d much rather be nice to my characters (most of whom I quite like), but I know my stories would be degraded.
Does this help explain why there’s suffering in the universe? Is God telling a great story?
Now I can hear the objections – “That’s obscene! When we contemplate the evil suffered by innocents in places like Gaza, it’s simply an insult to suggest that God is using those people like toys in some cosmic story-telling game.”
To that I reply – very tentatively – suppose it’s not just a game. Suppose stories aren’t actually trivial?
Suppose stories are the most important things there are?
Suppose our universe is not just “a” story, but “THE” story – and that story is the glory of God, the music of the spheres, the liturgy of the Great Throne, the song of angels.
If that still seems trivial to you, I ask this question – “What can you suggest that’s more serious than a story – if you’re in it?”
And suppose – just suppose – you had an assurance from the Author that somehow – in some way you can’t comprehend – the ending would be happy?
I am embarrassed to admit that up until a few days ago I had never heard of Norwegian author Jon Fosse, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature last week. He is a novelist and a playwright – reportedly the most performed Norwegian playwright in the world after Henrik Ibsen. He was born in Haugesund (the region where my paternal family came from) and passed through a period of atheism and alcoholism before becoming (like Sigrid Undset) a Roman Catholic.
According to this article from CNE news, Fosse does not write explicitly Christian fiction, but his faith informs his work:
…Both he and his third wife, Anna, are Catholics that have explored their faith together. Fosse says that it is important to keep away from noises. He never watches TV nor listens to the radio. He rarely listens to music. In the midst of pursuing solitude, Fosse sees writing as a confession and a prayer.
“Writing is in itself a way of asking for forgiveness. I think so. And it’s probably prayer, too. When you pray, it is not the satisfied person in you who prays. Not the smug one in you. Often, I think that the worse a person has it, the closer they are in a certain sense to God,” he said.
I am planning to get acquainted with Fosse’s work, and will be writing more about him in the future.
I’m old enough to remember when the late Arthur Hailey was riding high on a string of bestsellers, some of which (like Airport) were made into big movies. I never read any of his books myself, though. When his final novel, Detective, became available cheap, I figured I’d give him a try.
Final judgment: By all accounts this is his weakest novel, but even so it leaves me with no desire whatever to read any more of them.
Malcolm Ainslie is a Miami police detective. He’s headed out of the station to start a much-needed family vacation one day, when he gets an urgent call. Elroy Doil, a convicted serial killer Malcolm helped to put away, is scheduled for execution that evening. He’s announced that he wants to make a confession, but he’ll only talk to Malcolm.
The timing is terrible, and it demands a long, fast drive up to the prison in Raiford. But Malcolm can’t resist going. When he and his partner arrive, they have just a half hour to talk to Doil, who admits he committed most of the vicious torture killings he was accused of. But he swears one of them wasn’t his work.
Before being led to execution, Doil begs Malcolm for absolution, knowing that Malcolm is an ex-Catholic priest. Malcolm no longer has any faith, but he says a few words to comfort him.
This sets Malcolm on a course of investigation to learn whether one of the killings was actually a copycat. The answer to that will be a shock to the city and the nation.
Okay, what was good about Detective? I guess I’d have to say it’s educational. This is a police procedural and a half. Hailey was famous for researching the bejeebers out of a profession and then describing all its facets in detail in a book. He does this here.
And that’s about all I have to say positive about the book (though I did finish it). First of all, Hailey was a dull stylist. There’s not a spark of wit or lyricism in the whole manuscript. There were moments of excitement, but that was pure plotting, without the benefit of prose effects.
The fulsome, overstuffed quality extends to character descriptions. Whenever a character of any importance is introduced, we get treated to a few paragraphs of info dump about them. We learn, all in one gulp, about their childhoods, their careers, and what traumas made them what they are. This is an industrial, interchangeable-parts approach to storytelling – and it’s boring.
The big thing that annoyed me was that the book was preachy – from the negative side. The author has satisfied himself that all religion is bunk – though important, for some reason. But all sensible people have rejected organized religion. He wants you to understand that. The one priest in the book who actually believes the Faith is – of course – a strident caricature.
Also, the self-conscious political liberalism of the narrative is kind of amusing, considering what’s happened in the decades since the book was published in the 1990s. We’re treated to a sort of old Disney fantasy of an egalitarian society where racial integration is succeeding beautifully, and everybody coexists happily. Little did Hailey expect that this model would not satisfy the Left, who’d soon be calling for the whole cultural edifice to be incinerated.
“Dangerosa Jones” at the Regular Rules on Substack has posted a highly flattering review of King of Rogaland:
This combination of history and myth produces a ripping yarn. There is no other way to put it. Father Ailill and Erling are by no means perfect. They are holy warriors only in the most flawed and human of ways — this makes them interesting, multi-dimensional, and armed, a compelling combination. I do not like the popular form taken by current fantasy novels, most of the time, as I find the characters shallow and the conflicts contrived. These books are the exception that proves the rule.
She sighed and said, “He’s quite sweet, actually, beneath all the company bluff and bluster. I kept thinking of Graham Greene the whole time I was with him.”
Jay didn’t get the reference.
“I don’t follow.”
“I mean, I think he’ll end up dead, sooner than later.”
I think of Graham Greene myself, actually, whenever I read a Kevin Wignall novel. The difference is that I find Greene wholly opaque to my comprehension, while I quite enjoy Wignall. On the other hand, Greene has a moral center (though I may differ with his judgments), while I’m never sure what Wignall wants me to think about his characters.
Jay Lewis, hero of Ice in the Blood, is a former CIA agent, now working freelance private security. Currently he’s living on the French Riviera, heading up security for Vitali Petrov, a Belorussian general who’s planning a coup in his home country. He has the support of the US and Britain. However, Jay is in fact a double agent, working for an undisclosed employer to thwart the coup.
Jay’s seen and done most everything, but he’s not prepared for the sudden appearance of a former girlfriend who has brought along a ten-year-old boy whom she says is Jay’s son (Jay never knew he existed). She’s a peaceful person, a career relief worker. She doesn’t know how to handle a boy like this Owen, who is obviously Jay’s son to anyone who looks at them both, and possesses what seems like an innate talent for intrigue and violence.
The woman disappears before Jay can figure out a way to put her off, leaving Owen in his care. Well, he’ll have to find someone to look after him, but that will take a few days to arrange. In the meantime, he lets the boy tag along with him. Owen clearly hungers for a male role model, and Jay quickly warms to him, even finding him useful as camouflage and as a source of information. Especially when Owen makes friends with Petrov’s son. A plan begins to gel in Jay’s mind – but it will involve putting Owen at some degree of risk.
But what if Owen wants to be just like his dad?
In a story like this, one expects the hero to learn heartwarming lessons about love and responsibility as parenthood changes him inwardly. And that does happen to some extent. But it’s a lot more complex than that, and in the end I wasn’t sure what to make of the story’s resolution.
But it was a good story, well-told, vivid, and exciting. I enjoyed it, but I’m not sure it didn’t corrupt me a little.
I meant to illustrate this little report with my own vivid, dramatic photography, but I forgot it takes an indeterminate amount of time to upload from my phone to Dropbox to Photobucket. So I’ll post the pictures whenever that’s accomplished, unless the passage of time should render them obsolete.
I have now completed what should become (unless the Lord or the festival organizers block me) the most intense couple of weeks in my annual schedule. Norsk Høstfest in Minot and the Midwest Viking Festival in Green Bay, it appears, generally run on adjacent weeks, which means a 9-hour (either way) drive to North Dakota and a 5-hour (either way) drive to Wisconsin on consecutive weekends. Which is a challenge for a man of my, shall we say, experience and maturity. Yesterday I spent mostly in bed, and I actually slept a lot – something that I don’t do much these days unless I’m physically played out. Today I did some catching up – unloading my car (for the last time this season), washing clothes (not for the last time this season – pay no attention to the rumors), and catching up on email. And now I report to you.
First of all, the Midwest Viking Festival in Green Bay was kind of awesome. I was highly impressed. We used to do it in Moorhead, Minn. at the Hjemkomst Viking Ship Museum. That was also great, but we outwore our welcome somehow. This festival involved the most serious reenactors I’ve encountered (in this country) and was very well organized. It’s assembled around a replica Viking house in the grindhus style, built by my friend Owen Christianson and his wife Elspeth.
The weather was cool and windy, with some light rain on Friday, the first day. Saturday was colder but clear. This was actually pretty good weather for a Viking encampment. One of the chronic problems of Viking reenacting in this country is that we usually do it at summer festivals, where the woolen clothing appropriate to Northern European conditions gets rather uncomfortable. But wool was just the thing this weekend.
We had a large assembly of reenactors, mostly craftspeople of one kind or another, eager to show off their skills. The group Telge Glima, from Sweden, was there to demonstrate Viking athletic games twice a day, and their shows were followed by blunt steel combat by our fighters.
Because of the specialized nature of the event, our visitors seemed, by and large, really interested in the festival’s topic. That meant they were eager to buy books, and I sold off my stock of Viking Legacy early the first afternoon. Next year I’ll know to bring more.
I was particularly gratified to hear Viking Legacy referenced in conversation by someone who wasn’t even aware of my connection to it. And one woman who examined my novels said she’d just been looking at them on Amazon. That’s something I don’t think I’ve ever heard before from a potential customer.
So I was pleased with the whole thing. Next time, I think I’ll schedule a third night in a motel rather than driving home the same night. I made it safely, but it was probably an imprudent journey for a man of my experience and… well, you know.
Today’s hymn about the life to come is from the great Issac Watts (1674-1748), an English Nonconformist minister and the father of English hymnody. The text has been arranged to fit other tunes, which may be more commonly sung than this one judging by what’s available on YouTube. The video above is a piano recording for the tune “Bethlehem” by German musician and clergyman Gottfried Wilhelm Fink (1783-1846).
“After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands . . .” (Rev. 7:9 ESV)
1 How bright these glorious spirits shine! Whence all their white array? How came they to the blissful seats of everlasting day? Lo! these are they from suff’rings great who came to realms of light! and in the blood of Christ have washed those robes which shine so bright.
2 Now, with triumphal palms, they stand before the throne on high, and serve the God they love, amidst the glories of the sky. His presence fills each heart with joy, tunes ev’ry mouth to sing: by day, by night, the sacred courts with glad hosannas ring.
3 Hunger and thirst are felt no more, nor suns with scorching ray; God is their sun, whose cheering beams diffuse eternal day. The Lamb which dwells amidst the throne shall o’er them still preside, feed them with nourishment divine, and all their footsteps guide.
4 ‘Mong pastures green he’ll lead his flock where living streams appear; and God the Lord from ev’ry eye shall wipe off ev’ry tear. To him who sits upon the throne, the God whom we adore, and to the Lamb that once was slain, be glory evermore!
The greatest displeasure of the largest number Is the law of nature. – Pao Chao, “The Ruined City”
Paul J. Pastor writes about The Kalevala, an epic poem written from Karelian and Finnish folklore, focusing on “the great bard Väinämöinen” who chooses to live
on the island with no words on the mainland with no trees.
After a long while, if I’m reading this correctly, Väinämöinen begins to sing the world into being.
Pastor applies this to our own small creative works. Silence, not just moments of quiet, but true silence that endures beyond our comfort can be “the great and difficult friend of the writer and the artist.”
We are not artistic dynamos. We cannot truly create anything of own mere will. We must rely on the Lord and his revelation, both general and specific. Noise, even a natural and healthy noise of life, can drain us—at least, it does drain me.
And yet what brings Väinämöinen, the bard of bards, into the fullness of his power is precisely that condition of emptiness that so disgusts or unsettles us. It is being in the boring-place, the empty-place, the still-place that something happens to him, something so vast that nature itself unlocks her most intimate secrets.
The great bard began singing on a rock so bare we would have trouble finding a similar one today, but we may find a deafening silence among ruins, a place where
. . . grains of sand, like startled birds, are looking for a safe place to settle. Bushes and creepers, confused and tangled, seem to know no boundaries.
These verses come from fifth century Chinese poet Pao Chao (or Bān Zhāo). In “The Ruined City,” he describes a vast plain with visible canals and roads cut into it, all leading to crumbled ends and weeds.
The young girls from east and south Smooth as silk, fragrant as orchids White as jade with their lips red, Now lie beneath the dreary stones and barren earth. The greatest displeasure of the largest number Is the law of nature.
This too is silence and a little despair; we need more than human hope to endure it. Can we throw seeds into the wind that will sprout in what time the Lord will give them? Kyrie, eleison.
A newly elected school board member of Peoria Unified School District Board in Glendale, Arizona, has been told to stop quoting scripture at the beginning of school board meetings because the district believed it was a violation of the First Amendment. They took this stand in response to letters from organizations such as the Freedom From Religion Foundation.
